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24 July 2010
Astronomy Without A Telescope – Our Ageing Universe
It all started so full of promise. All at once, our universe burst upon the scene, but much of that initial burst quickly dissipated into background neutrinos and photons – and ever since, pretty much  everything our universe has ever done has just dissipated more energy. So, despite the occasional enthusiastic outburst of supernovae and [...]
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23 June 2010
Cosmologists Provide Closest Measure of Elusive Neutrino
Cosmologists – and not particle physicists — could be the ones who finally measure the mass of the elusive neutrino particle. A group of cosmologists have made their most accurate measurement yet of the mass of these mysterious so-called "ghost particles." They didn't use a giant particle detector but used data from the largest survey [...]
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12 June 2010
Astronomy Without A Telescope – Is Time Real?
Time is an illusion caused by the passage of history (Douglas Adams 1952-2001). The way that we deal with time is central to a major current schism in physics. Under classic Newtonian physics and also quantum mechanics – time is absolute, a universal metronome allowing you determine whether events occur simultaneously or in sequence. Under Einstein's physics, [...]
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10 May 2010
Team Finds Most-Distant Galaxy Cluster Ever Seen
Like a location from Star Wars, this galaxy cluster is far, far away and with origins a long, long time ago. With the ungainly name of SXDF-XCLJ0218-0510, this cluster is actually the most distant cluster of galaxies ever seen. It is a whopping 9.6 billion light years away, and X-ray and infrared observations [...]
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26 April 2010
New Images from Planck Reveal Star Formation Processes
While most newborn stars are hidden beneath a blanket of gas and dust, the Planck space observatory – with its microwave eyes – can peer beneath that shroud to provide new insights into star formation. The latest images released by the Planck team bring to light two different star forming regions in the Milky [...]
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25 April 2010
GOODS, Under Astronomers' AEGIS, Produce GEMS
No, not really (but I got all three key words into the title in a way that sorta makes sense). Astronomers, like most scientists, just love acronyms; unfortunately, like most acronyms, on their own the ones astronomers use make no sense to non-astronomers. And sometimes not even when written in full: GOODS = Great Observatories Origins Survey; OK [...]
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14 April 2010
Magnetic Fields in Inter-cluster Space: Measured at Last
The strength of the magnetic fields here on Earth, on the Sun, in inter-planetary space, on stars in our galaxy (the Milky Way; some of them anyway), in the interstellar medium (ISM) in our galaxy, and in the ISM of other spiral galaxies (some of them anyway) have been measured. But there have been no [...]
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18 March 2010
This is Getting Boring: General Relativity Passes Yet another Big Test!
Published in 1915, Einstein's theory of general relativity (GR) passed its first big test just a few years later, when the predicted gravitational deflection of light passing near the Sun was observed during the 1919 solar eclipse. In 1960, GR passed its first big test in a lab, here on Earth; the Pound-Rebka experiment. And over [...]
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21 February 2010
Dark Matter in Distant Galaxy Groups Mapped for the First Time
Galaxy density in the Cosmic Evolution Survey (COSMOS) field, with colors representing the redshift of the galaxies, ranging from redshift of 0.2 (blue) to 1 (red). Pink x-ray contours show the extended x-ray emission as observed by XMM-Newton. Dark matter (actually cold, dark – non-baryonic – matter) can be detected only by its gravitational influence. In [...]
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20 February 2010
ESA's Tough Choice: Dark Matter, Sun Close Flyby, Exoplanets (Pick Two)
Key questions relevant to fundamental physics and cosmology, namely the nature of the mysterious dark energy and dark matter (Euclid); the frequency of exoplanets around other stars, including Earth-analogs (PLATO); take the closest look at our Sun yet possible, approaching to just 62 solar radii (Solar Orbiter) … but only two! What would be your [...]
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09 February 2010
Seven-Year WMAP Results: No, They're NOT Anomalies
Since the day the first Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) data were released, in 2003, all manner of cosmic microwave background (CMB) anomalies have been reported; there's been the cold spot that might be a window into a parallel universe, the "Axis of Evil", pawprints of local interstellar neutral hydrogen, and much, much more. But do [...]
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08 February 2010
Universe to WMAP: ΛCDM Rules, OK?
The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) science team has finished analyzing seven full years' of data from the little probe that could, and once again it seems we can sum up the universe in six parameters and a model. Using the seven-year WMAP data, together with recent results on the large-scale distribution of galaxies, and an [...]
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18 January 2010
Searching for Life in the Multiverse
Other intelligent and technologically capable alien civilizations may exist in our Universe, but the problems with finding and communicating with them is that they are simply too far away for any meaningful two-way conversations. But what about the prospect of finding if life exists in other universes outside of our own? (...)Read the rest of [...]
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23 November 2009
The Extremely Large Telescope
The European Southern Observatory (ESO) is planning on building a massive – and I do mean massive – telescope in the next decade. The European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) is a 42-meter telescope in its final planning stages. Weighing in at 5,000 tonnes, and made up of 984 individual mirrors, it will be able to [...]
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06 November 2009
Early Galaxy Pinpoints Reionization Era
Astronomers looking to pinpoint when the reionozation of the Universe took place have found some of the earliest galaxies about 800 million years after the Big Bang. 22 early galaxies were found using a method that looks for far-away redshifting sources that disappear or "drop-out" at a specific wavelength. The age of one [...]
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